Interconnecting the Deliberative System

Abstract

Within recent academic work on deliberative democracy, a number of writers have turned their attention to the idea of the deliberative system (Mansbridge 1999; Chambers 2009; Dryzek 2010; Parkinson and Mansbridge 2012). Rather than simply focusing on the extent that particular parts, elements and types of institution do or do not meet standards of deliberative democracy, the focus is now on the appropriate division of labour between them, their interdependence and interaction. Therefore, the issue of how to combine and interconnect these parts and institutions with other processes to ensure the norms of deliberative democracy are prevalent across the system as a whole becomes a primary issue. However, to date, little has been said about what the ‘interconnectors’ of a deliberative system should be like, how they would function, how they would interconnect the system, and how they should relate to the norms of deliberative democracy. Habermas (1996) proposes ‘discursive structures’ to link the informal and formal public spheres in his ‘two track model’, but offers scant detail on the nature of the structures. Mansbridge (1999) discusses numerous different ‘discursive arenas’ in which varying modes of communication are employed, but tells us little about how everyday talk and structured deliberation should be interconnected, what this would involve and how it could be achieved. Mansbridge et al. (2012) point to the need for the system to be appropriately connected if pathologies are to be avoided, but do not engage in detail with the requirements of these interconnectors. Parkinson (2006: 170), identifies the informal, intermediate and formal realms of deliberation, and does make some specific suggestions for interconnecting these realms and similarly, Hendriks (2006) distinguishes between macro, micro, and mixed discursive spheres. In short, much more theory and empirical evidence is required on how to interconnect the parts of a deliberative system.